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I miss my grandmother. She brings tears to my eyes when I think back on our time together. She would’ve turned 98 last weekend. And while she lived a good, long life, she’s been dead for about eight years.

Sometimes I wonder what she’d say to me — what she’d think of my academic endeavors, writing, friends, and loves.

Would she be proud of her grandson? Would I be living up to her expectations? Would she understand how much I miss her?

There are times when I stare at an old photo of the two of us. There she is, in her pearl earrings — a gem from another generation. She was a product of a time when women demanded civil liberties and spoke out bravely. Individually, she was highly educated, musically gifted, crafted an alarmingly kind, talented group of friends. She attracted her equals. I admired her.

But now, as I reflect on these eight years, I long for a video, text, or email between us. Something I can click play on.

There is nothing. I can’t find any artifact nor proof of our love and affection — our bond. We only have a handful of progressively fading photographs. Burned, stained from the sun, time is making us increasingly more sepia and prone to rosy retrospection.

Towards the latter years of her life, I grabbed whatever technology I had — at the time, a Motorola Razr — and pointed the “camera” her way. She didn’t mind my intrusion. She didn’t “get” that there was a video camera on the phone. I held it up as she talked to one of her dear friends.

She was talking about me and said into the phone, “Yes, Sam’s going to Colorado University.” I chimed in, like I always had to as her memory waned, “No Francie, Colorado State University.” She quickly relayed that correction.

A few more seconds passed and I turned off the camera. Somehow I knew this would be one of the most important, last moments with her. Her hospice treatments had accelerated. She was becoming weaker, but her hands gripped firm with mine until the end. She’d pass away shortly after this call.

To have that file meant the video was mine. I’d have it as long as I’d like it. A rare glimpse, however distorted and pixelated that would take me back.

Her voice. Her demeanor. Her playfulness. For a few seconds.

It’d have to do. There wasn’t much else to cling and hold.

Maybe it was her birthday, or maybe it was my addiction to nostalgia; whatever it was, I looked for the clip the other day. I desperately wanted to relive it. To touch through time. To bridge the gap between life and death. To see the pixels dance before my eyes and make me feel… there.

Amidst gigabytes of photos and videos on my computer, the little clip was gone. I rummaged through flash drives, hard drives, cloud storage — nothing. There was no file to be found.

It was a foreign feeling — loss — amidst this digital era. We live in a time of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Gmail, Google Drive, iCloud, and Dropbox. Data costs little to nothing. And the world seems settled on one major goal: saving and storing your life for eternity.

Today, it’s not uncommon for me to send hundreds of texts, emails, and tweets in a day between friends and family — many of which include photos and videos.

I’m curious what Francie would think of these advancements. As I get older, the data seems to have a redundancy and staying power — beyond anything we could’ve imagined 10 years ago. She died before we started speaking to our phones, searching for rashes on WebMD, and sharing our meals over Facebook.

A file created today may well live beyond my lifetime, and maybe even my children’s (if I’m lucky enough to have them some day). What of these things would be passed onto future generations?

There’s that photo of me crossing the marathon finish line in Houston. There’s that kiss with my love in Colombia. There’s that random photo of my cousin and I when we were four years old — grinning from ear to ear. There’s that video tour of my old, Siberian-prison inspired apartment.

They’ll outlive me.

Storage is becoming cheaper every day. Companies are propositioning themselves to be the keeper of all your photos and videos, forever — just look at Google Photos. They’re saying they have the ultimate solution. Unlike my missing video of Francie, photos and videos are now saved and backed up; then, replicated across data centers across the globe. No flood, tornado, earthquake, hurricane, or mudslide can touch these memories. No user or device error can stop us now.

Maybe she belongs in the past, but she’d be here so much more amidst this technology. I could share a video of Francie to my partner. And I could connect with the memories that my mind slowly lets drift. Nothing would pass the intense scrutiny and analysis of today’s servers. The computers might serve the memories to me when I needed them most.

But what happens now? What will happen to our memories as they pass from generation to generation in this increasingly connected and backed up society? What will companies keep of us? What will our loved ones hold on to? What will they look to for connection with their pasts?

Cooked is about the transformation from raw to cooked foods. This simple difference is what Pollan thinks distinguishes man from the rest of the animal kingdom. He’s got a point: we love our cooked food. The flavors ignite. Further, when we cook food we chew less and do more than eat all day.

In the first episode of the Netflix series, Pollan explains how hunting, farming, and scavenging have all been outsourced. We’ve simplified the process of eating on every level. Corporate giants have vertically integrated food prep and delivery with surprising efficiency. From frozen meals to prepackaged sandwiches, everything has been prepared for us. For example, the turkey has been raised, fed, slaughtered, plucked, deboned, frozen, thawed, sliced, seasoned, and placed. We don’t see the life and death — we’ve outsourced everything.

The reasons for the decline in food production and cooking are multifaceted. It seems work and productivity have motivated us to pursue this path. Imagine the busy lawyer or medical doctor having a catered lunch because they are “too busy” to prepare and eat. We accept this in society — hell, we encourage it. We accept there’s a certain class of people who cannot “afford” to spend the time making food. And we accept that people should specialize until they merely focus on their vocational tasks.

As the episode unfolded, my appreciation of food outsourcing shifted more globally. I thought about what else gets outsourced. Our society has taken almost everything off of our plates so that we can focus more time on other activities. We continue to specialize well beyond food.

The decline of manufacturing in America can largely be seen as an effort to reduce costs, time, and environmental burden on the countries that now produce. We’ve outsourced the “negatives” and taken the cost savings. Comically, we criticize China for using so many coal-fired power plants and then click buy on our new computer, coffee maker, smartphone, etc. — all made in China.

We’ve outsourced reading longer books and research to journalists and even computer algorithms. Now, people read books for us and distill what we need to know — what’s most important. Consequently, this means we get a synthesized perspective of a book. It’s like playing the telephone game through articles, but most of the time we read that review to understand the book.

Even budgeting and financial management are thrown to others. We use Mint.com or other financial software to manage and update us about spending. There’s no need to balance a checkbook anymore — I’m not sure if I’d even know how. We trust financial advisers and/or digital facsimiles to manage everything for us. We’ve got better, more important things to focus on!

More and more, we watch sports and reality TV shows instead of playing outside and engaging in our own relationships. The drama of a royal, elite families and others’ lives encapsulates our attention, as those nearest us seem to wane. Many watch the throw, shot, or pass, but I’m not sure how many are making that throw, shot, or pass themselves anymore.

Even in academic circles, professors and graduate students are using other people to do their statistical analysis. Academics can even outsource their statistical analysis to India for further review and completion. Afterwards, with a nice, clean result in hand, researchers can write up the interpretations — or pay another person to do that part.

And as I type these words, they’re being stored in a cloud server for safekeeping, backup, and preparation for publication on my website. Both the cloud and website servers are miles and miles away from me. I’ll never see the computers, nor would I need to. I’ve outsourced these storage needs — someone else is handling them for me.

Again, I settle on this simple conclusion: we’ve embraced the streamlining of our lives for the purpose of efficiency. But what is this efficiency for? Is it so that we can focus on work more? Is it so that we can make more money? Is it so we can relax more?

Absent of answers, I wonder where we’ll be in a few decades. When asked questions about our personality and identities and hobbies, will we reply that we enjoy watching and reading others’ accounts of life? Will we effectively outsource our identities to the TV shows, movies, and reviews of reviews?

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I’m back with another terrific group of articles! The following share the themes of simple living and frugality. As an avid reader and writer about personal finance concerns, it’s interesting to see how reading more helps me focus on my goal of a better budget and savings. Hope these help you, too!

Thoreau, the First Declutterer by Danny Heitman
Have you ever read Walden by Thoreau? Well, if not, it’s about time! Thoreau is widely considered one of the foremost frugal fans of all time. He decided to move into a small cabin — isolated from much of society to write and reflect. In this article, the author points out how Thoreau modeled his life and can offer inspiration to others.

The Cloud Generation: No Longer Buys All The Things by Sheree Joseph
As technology has enabled people to forego physical clutter and fill cloud storage, minimalism is growing increasingly mainstream. The benefits are twofold: we’re buying and polluting less. Older generations have shown some hesitancy to trusting the cloud, while the younger, “Cloud Generation,” seems to be making the move in droves.

Stop Buying in Bulk by Eric Holthaus
It can be appealing to get 200 hot dogs, 20 bottles of ketchup, or a monster-sized jar of nuts. Big-box wholesalers such as Costco and Sam’s Club have made great businesses out of bulk sales. The math is generally simple: when you can buy more, you save more per item. But research is showing that we might not be saving as much as we hope.

The Best Waterfront Property Is Your Tent by Katie Jackson
This might be my favorite article over the last couple weeks. In a twist on tired travel guides, Outside Magazine proposes a waterfront property that isn’t yours to keep. But you’re welcome to have it tonight. Camping is one of the best ways to affordably travel, explore, and see the world.